


Cycle 27 (Seven Birds)

by ElectricBoomerang



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: Gen, also there's an OC that sort of has a major role in the plot, she's mostly there to provide exposition and get the IPRE crew where the need to be though
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-10-01
Updated: 2017-10-01
Packaged: 2019-01-07 21:55:02
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,258
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12241353
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ElectricBoomerang/pseuds/ElectricBoomerang
Summary: The prophecy made a lot more sense the first time they heard it.





	Cycle 27 (Seven Birds)

**Author's Note:**

> I was thinking about how much I wish that the prophecy was explained a little more, specifically, why seven /birds/ of all things, and then this happened.

“So,” Lup asked the tiefling woman, tilting her head to the side. “What’s your name?”

“I’m the Guide. What are y’all’s names?” the woman answered, looking at the seven explorers. When they did their survey of the Prime Material Plane that cycle, they had decided that the world was peaceful enough to send all seven down to get the Light.

“I’m Lup, that’s my brother, Taako, there’s Barold J. Bluejeans, then Magnus, the short one’s Davenport, and the nerd writing down everything we say is Lucretia,” she introduced, ignoring the tiefling’s odd name. They’d met people with weirder names over the years.

The Guide’s amicable smile fell for a moment. “Forgive me, but I got the impression the seven of y’all were… grown.”

“Barely,” Davenport muttered good-naturedly, glancing at Magnus.

“Hey!” he exclaimed exaggeratedly. “I said I was sorry. Besides, if I hadn’t lied on my application form, I wouldn’t be here!”

The rest of the group exploded into laughter, the topic of Magnus claiming her was a year and a half older than he was to get onto the Starblaster mission being a familiar one, having been brought up less than two years into their journey.

After the laughter died down, the Guide asked, “Why don’t you have your titles?”

“Our what now?” Lucretia said, looking up from her journal.

“Y’know. Your titles. Your grown-up names,” she paused, seeing their confusion. “Given to you by the Seer herself once you’re of age?”

“Well, Guide, between you and me,” Taako leaned in close. “I guess you could say the seven of us are… from out of town, so to speak.”

Her eyes practically lit up. “And you need someone to take you to the Seer?”

Davenport looked up at her with narrowed eyes. “That depends. Does the Seer know where to find the Light of Cre- this… thing that fell out of the sky a few days ago, somewhere around here?”

She smiled. “The Seer found the Fallen Star just a few days ago, before those eyes appeared. Scared the two of us half to death! We thought the Final Pam was coming for us for sure,” she laughed breathlessly. “Yeah… we kind of- we need the Fallen Star,” Merle told her. “If we don’t, those eyes’ll come back and tear apart… pretty much everything.”

“Then let’s hop to it,” she turned on her heel, gesturing to a large house on the top of a distant hill.

“So, who exactly is the Final Pam?” Lucretia asked, walking to catch up to her.

“They say she’ll embrace both her birth name, and her title, and bring about the end of days. Some of the legends call her both the metric by which the world will be judged, and the judge, and executioner. Basically, she’s bad news all around.”

Lucretia nodded, writing it down into her journal. “May I ask if the symbol on your jacket means anything?”

The Guide looked down at the silhouette of a dolphin embroidered on the right of her lilac jacket. “Oh, that’s my animal. When the Seer gives you your title, she also assigns you an animal that matches your personality. It doesn’t really mean much nowadays, but it’s an old tradition to know what your animal is, and to wear stuff that flaunts it.”

“What’s the difference between your animal and your title? Er- I guess a better question is, why both?” Lucretia asked curiously. Her favorite part of every cycle had to be all the cultures she got to explore, without a doubt.

“That’s simple, Miss. Your animal is a reflection of who you are now, of your personality, but your title’s who you’re gonna be, your future,” she smiled.

“What’s the meaning of you being the Guide?”

“You’re just full of questions, aren’t you?” she said rhetorically. “The Seer says that I’m the Guide because I’m supposed to bring the seven star-catchers to her, and help save… everyone. And well, here you are!”

 

The Seer was kneeling in front of a burning hearth at the center of the room, her white cloak almost reminiscent of a lab coat, the silhouette of a turtle visible on the back, as she was facing away from the door. She turned her head to look at them as the heavy doors swung closed again, leaving the only light in the room to be her hearth. Behind her glasses were relatively young eyes, yet they held infinite wisdom, infinite knowledge. “Are these the star-catchers?”

The Guide beamed at her, making her way to sit across from the Seer. “They sure seem like it.”

“Sit,” she commanded. “You want the Fallen Star, right? I’m not giving it to the first people who ask, even if you did come from across the cosmos. I need to read your fortunes first.”

Once they were all sat down, forming a semicircle on the opposite side of the fire that the Seer sat at, Merle asked, “Soooo, how… exactly do you “read our fortunes”, miss… uh-”

She sighed. “Seer. Miss Seer will do. And it’s simple. We wait, and the fire will tell us.”

After what was probably only a few minutes of waiting, Magnus stage-whispered to Lucretia “how much longer do you think this’ll take?”

And at that moment, the fire roared as if someone had dumped a gallon of gasoline on it, changing to a pinkish color, causing everyone, including the Guide, to jump back, except for the Seer.

The Seer gasped. Her voice sounded faint, distant, as if she was speaking from universes away. “ _I saw all of existence, all at once. I saw a dark storm, a living Hunger, eating it from within. But I saw a brilliant light, heralded by seven birds._

 _“_ _I saw seven birds.”_ Suddenly, her voice changed. It sounded like she was speaking two-fold, one voice layered over the weaker one, yet they were both still her voice.

_“The Twins._

_“The Lover._

_“The Protector._

_“The Lonely Journalkeeper._

_“The Peacemaker._

_“And the Wordless One.”_ She paused, the fire receeding back to a size that wasn’t in danger of burning down the building, and she continued in an awed voice, the weaker version of her voice gone. “The Twins, the Lover, the Protector, the Lonely Journalkeeper, the Peacemaker, and the Wordless One. Those are your titles. And it seems… the seven of you are all birds.”

Lup turned to the Guide. “Does that… normally happen?”

The Guide took a deep, steadying breath. “Never in my life have I seen that happen. Y’all really are something different, aren’t you?”

“Why birds?” Taako asked the Seer from across the fire.

“You’re always migrating, and you… will be, for a long time, I think,” the Seer informed him.

 

The next day, they left to get back to the ship, the Light of Creation in Davenport’s arms. “Lucretia, can I have a word?” the Seer asked.

Lucretia paused, making her way to stand beside the Seer. “Yes?”

“This… is going to seem inconsequential now, and will for many years, but I think I should tell you,” she said.

Lucretia narrowed her eyes, but didn’t say anything.

“ _Whatever you do, don’t let them make the Relics. It will bring only pain and destruction_ ,” the Seer hissed.

Lucretia nodded solemnly. “And… Seer, before I go, I want to ask. What… what’s your birth name? That may be a little too personal, and I apologize for that, but there’s a voice at the back of my mind, telling me that it’s important.”

“I understand completely. My name was-

"My name was Maureen.”

**Author's Note:**

> Basically, Maureen is an alternate version of the Seer, sort of like how Merle has distant family members over on Podcast Planet, and what I tired to set up here was that when Maureen entered the Cosmoscope, the Seer got some... backlash from that, and got the same prophecy, as well as a few random facts about the Starblaster Crew's future.
> 
> Also, was making the Final Pam a part of their lore necessary?  
> No.  
> Was that going to stop me?  
> Hell no.  
> (But seriously, I realized that her name sorta matched up with the naming convention of this world and I just couldn't resist.)


End file.
